Episode Details

Every Christmas, you see this image as a painting, meme, card, or ornament: a devoted Santa Claus, with his red elf-hat removed, kneels before the Christ-child in a manger. Still, many well-meaning Christians see Santa as a pretender to Christ’s throne rather than a worshiper before Him. How do faithful fans respond? What do you think about the “Santa Claus vs. Jesus Christ” clash at Christmas?

Concession stand

• If you just got here to Fantastical Truth, this episode builds on many others.
• We have a growing body of work here and at Lorehaven about magic and Santa.
• Also, no, we’re not accusing anyone of legalism here. That’d be legalistic.

Quotes and notes

• Redeeming Santa Legends for Delighting in Grace, article
• Don’t Ditch Santa, part 1, article
• Don’t Ditch Santa, part 2, article
• Jesus vs. Santa Notions are Stuff and Nonsense, article
• Fictional Magic, two-part podcast series

Author and pastor John Piper writes:

It is mindboggling to me that any Christian would even contemplate such a trade, that we would divert attention away from the incarnation of the God of the universe into this world to save us and our children. Not only is Santa Claus not true — and Jesus is very truth himself — but compared to Jesus, Santa is simply pitiful, and our kids should be helped to see this.

Santa Claus offers only earthly things, nothing lasting, nothing eternal.

Bethany J. wrote:

I’m not a fan of Santa, myself, but my big issue with him isn’t the make-believe (which is fine!) or even the “competition” he supposedly makes for the true purpose of Christmas. My issue with him is that it often goes beyond make-believe and becomes just a flat-out lie. I don’t have a problem with Christians including Santa in their Christmas traditions, but should Christian parents really tell their kids that Santa is REAL, when he’s not?

JoAnna wrote:

Many years ago we stopped playing the Santa game because I had a child who insisted Santa was real but not Jesus. She was too confused by all the hype.

So we switched to treating Santa like [any] other cartoon character and made sure the kids all knew mom was the real gifter of toys ?. For us Christmas is a celebration of Jesus’s coming to earth along with celebrating the joy of being together. We’re not anti-Santa either. I try and teach my kids about St. Nicholas and many of the other wintertime characters.

William Umstattd wrote:

Giving gifts is a great analogy representing the gift Jesus was and is to the world. Jesus gave the gift of eternal life so we give gifts to each other on Christmas as a reenactment of what Jesus did for us.

We do this in December because winter is sad, depressing and cold. We were sad and depressed in our sin but then Jesus came and turned our sadness into happiness. Christmas and gift giving is the same but for winter instead of sin.

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